One week left until Labor Day. Begrudgingly (to at least some of us) we are about to turn the corner on summer and head into the fall. If you are one of the unlucky few working inside this week, check out these three top stories we found interesting, relevant, and valuable to businesses today.

The Unfortunate Truth About Requesting And Providing ReferencesIf you are a service firm like Indicate Media, your references are likely a key strategic component to your new business initiatives. Yet, many times when courting potential customers they’ll ask for references early on in the process. This always creates a conundrum for us. On one hand, we understand why a potential customer would like to speak with a reference to get a better sense of our style and ability to generate results, on the other hand we can’t just give over our client references to any old company who may or may not be serious about a working relationship. What do we do? Here is an interesting article by Ian Altman in Forbes that nicely sums up the unfortunate truth about references.

'This format has arrived' – The virtual reality revolution comes to news at CNNWe have long heard the rumors of how technology will revolutionize journalism. Of course with the advent of social media and the 24/7 news cycle, one could legitimately argue it already has. True. Yet, we have also seen many broken technology promises in journalism like the adoption of 3D or even the impact on citizen journalism. However, it looks like the next big journalistic revolution is here to stay and its name is ……. virtual reality. While you are probably not surprised, you may be shocked of exactly what this means for the relationship between the audience and stories they consume. You have got to check this out.

PR Insight of the WeekFive of the Coolest PR Strategies from Around the WorldDoing business around the world usually tends to require multiple strategies. What might work in the U.S. may fall flat in say Malaysia. Kara Alaimo, an Assistant Professor of Public Relations at Hofstra University took a look at this very concept in her new book titled, “Pitch, Tweet, or Engage on the Street: How to Practice Global Public Relations and Strategic Communication”. While this blog series isn’t designed to promote books, we did think Kara’s research was extremely interesting and worth sharing. Here is a sample of how PR professionals focus on specific audiences around the world.